Lips Of Faith - Brett Beer | New Belgium Brewing

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Notes / Commercial Description:
New Belgium Brewing and The Lost Abbey brewery from San Marcos, California have a shared passion for a variety of things, not the least of which is the wild Belgian yeast brettanomyces. So they decided to join forces and collaborate. Lost Abbey Collaboration is brewed simply with pale malts accompanied by Target, Centennial and Sorachi hops for a hint of citrus. Focusing on their mutual respect for the ingredient, the spotlight shines on the brettanomyces, where a full brett fermentation offers bold pineapple overtones and funky, sour edge. The beer is a shining, golden shade and is warming and dry.

1 pint 6 fl oz. bottle, with no apparent bottled on date present. Spotted this at the local beer store for $4.99. My first review of a collaboration beer on BeerAdvocate. Excited to try this!

Poured into a Firestone Walker pint glass.

A - Pours the color of a golden yellow lager, with lots of yeast matter slowly maneuvering itself around the glass. Quarter inch of fizzy white head disappears within seconds. Second pour yields another finger of quickly dissolving head and an even bigger gang of sediment floating about.

S - Smell is of yeast and some malt. Slight hint of sour funk, but faint. Almost smells like a Miller Lite, to my disappointment.

T - Very yeasty, slightly bitter, slightly tart. Carbonated; slightly bloating. Not as sour and funky as I had hoped for, but based on the reviews of others, it was to be expected. Not very fruity either, in my opinion, mostly just a very prominent Belgian yeast taste, which isn't my favorite.

M - Carbonated, yeasty, bacteria-like aftertaste from the brettanomyces. Slightly creamy mouthfeel. Pretty dry in the finish. I enjoy the aftertaste to this beer more than I enjoy the rest of it, sadly.

Overall, it is medium-bodied, and highly drinkable with a nicely masked 7.50% abv, yet the beer itself is underwhelming. I was definitely hoping for more from this New Belgium & The Lost Abbey collaboration, but such is life; we live and we learn. Glad to have tried it, yet it is definitely not a beer I will be having again. However, I am looking forward to other beers in the Lips Of Faith series, and with higher hopes for them than this one.

I have had this beer since August. It is time for the Brett to move on (down my throat).

The beer is golden in color with a lot of particulates floating in it. There is about two fingers of foam that stick around decently on the side of the glass.

Off the top I get some decent fruitiness. I pick up some pineapple and a decent amount of funkiness. The flavor continues the funk and there is some metallic. This is a challenging flavor with some balance issues.

A: This poured a cloudy dark straw with fluffy white head.
S: It smelled like horse blanket and wet cardboard, with some apricot and spicy Belgian yeast and bread crust.
T: It tasted like citrus zest and unripe apricot and bread crust, with some horse blanket and spicy Belgian yeast. It had a musty aftertaste that was a bit tart.
M: It was oily with moderate carbonation. Nice slick body.
D: This was a decent representation of brett, but not complex or delicious at all. The scent and taste were uninspired, although the body was nice. The finish was smooth enough, but not entirely clean. Maybe age would help, but fresh was not very exciting.

A - Hazy pale amber pour with a good frothy head, good retention and surface memory with fair touches of lacing.

S - Fruity, sweet, tropical notes...

T - …which flow in the palate. The tropical sweetness predominates. This is ok, unexpected, but nice, where is the brett? Bready and malty with almost no sense of funk under that pineapple and mango sweet lick.

M - Medium body and moderate carbonation with a fair smoothness unable to do much with the monochord sense.

O - Not anywhere near what one might expect of such a brew or collab. Drinkable sure… but...

Notes: All right, while nothing to blow the senses theses guys can do better (and worse). This is not a waste of money but with this quality it is not going to pick up in the name of the brewers alone. Pretty blah…

Original notes from a bottle tasting upon the release. More recently compared to a social tasting of the ale and while drinkable the impression does not change much...

A: Pours a cloudy medium straw yellow in color with some light orange highlights, light to moderate amounts of white and black sediment, and moderate amounts of visible carbonation. The beer has a finger tall fizzy and sudsy off-white head that quickly reduces to a small thick patch of medium sized bubbles, a very thin film covering the majority of the surface of the beer, and a thin ring at the edges of the glass. Moderate amounts of lacing are observed.

S: Moderate amounts of funky hay aromas with fruity notes (pineapple, pear, apple, and lemon/citrus), and just a hint of clove. Just a touch of earthiness.

T: The beer starts out with a light amount of pale malts which is quickly followed by light to moderate amounts of light fruits (pineapple, pear, and lemon zest). There is a light amount of hay, barnyard funk, and yeastiness towards the finish. Light amounts of bitterness and alcohol in the finish which lingers slightly.

M: Medium bodied with light to moderate amounts of carbonation. Very light amounts of acidity, alcohol heat, and dryness.

O: Unfortunately, I was a little disappointed in this beer - it is called Brett beer and it lacks much of the Brett flavor and aroma I was expecting. It was a little heavier in the mouthfeel than I was expecting, I wanted a little more acidity and dryness.

With the brewers of La Folie and Supplication coming together for a collaborative effort, what could possibly go wrong, right?

And its with a heavy yeasty goldenrod pour, the beer carries an aesthetic weight with its medium murk. A creamy white froth blankets the beer in liquefied fashion that lessens as the carbonation subsides and the acidity takes hold. With no surprise with these funky ales, only isolated islands of lace could be found early before the foam character collapses.

Mid-stream aromas start out semi-tart and firmly earthy. The tangy scent of dried fruit captivates the nose and then settles it with musty, dusty woods, yeasty dough, and saddle leather. And with only moderate acidity, the raw aroma of whole grain bread and damp earth is largely unsupported.

In similar fashion, the heavy bread taste is rich with vegemite, cookie dough, and weathered wood. Medium tartness bring about modest wine-like tartness that makes cameo appearances through the rich bready taste. Dried limes, crab apple, and peppered woods offer little complexity above the bread and yeast. Little in the way of hop character, the yeast and malts are left to battle out the balance that largely remains unresolved.

Its rich taste is also reflected in body. Not that it is a rich beer, but when highly acidic and dry ale is expected, then even medium-bodied beers seem heavy. And that's exactly how this beer plays out on the palate sensations. A turn to finish reveals only slim wine-like acidity and light alcohol warmth that leaves the mouth wanting more.

A lot like Sierra Nevada's collaboration brew with Russian River- Brux, the beer turns out young, unresolved, and immature. Where that beer may very well may mature gracefully for years, I'm somewhat less hopeful for this collaborative effort.